Naruto World, Konohagakure.
The fading glow of the setting sun streamed into a modest little house. A child sat blankly on the floor, his eyes dull as they swept aimlessly across the room. Not far from him, another child of nearly the same size slumped limply against the wall.
No one knew how much time had passed before the boy's eyes finally flickered with life.
"What the hell…? Wasn't I on a self-driving trip to Tibet when I got into a car accident? Where is this place?" Yoru muttered, clutching his head.
"Where… am I? My head hurts like hell…"
He slowly scanned his surroundings again. When his gaze landed on the child beside him, his pupils suddenly shrank.
"T-This… why does he look so much like me when I was young?"
Yoru stood up and walked over, examining the boy closely. His face was deathly pale—identical to how Yoru himself had looked as a child, as if molded from the same template.
"D-Dead?!" Yoru instinctively reached out to check the boy's breathing.
Nothing.
The child was already dead.
Yoru staggered back a few steps, nearly letting out a scream.
"Where the hell is this place?!"
After a long while, he finally forced himself to calm down and accept reality.
Because of his reckless idea of "The world is so big, I want to see it," he had gone on a solo road trip to Tibet. Then, without warning, an accident happened. A car crash.
And when he woke up—
He was here.
Once he steadied himself, Yoru finally began to carefully observe his surroundings.
This was a Japanese-style room. Two wardrobes, a refrigerator, and a tatami floor with a neatly laid futon. However, the entire place was messy and unkempt.
To the left stood a table and chair set. Two notebooks rested on the table.
Yoru walked over and picked one up, flipping it open.
"Today, Father was promoted to Special Jonin. Mother cooked a table full of delicious food. I'm so happy."
…
…
"Today was the first day at the Ninja Academy. The teacher taught us many things about ninjas. I will definitely become a great ninja like Father!"
…
…
"No! Mother… Father died in battle… this can't be real…"
The final handwriting was messy, the page stained with tear marks.
"A diary…" Yoru murmured, feeling fortunate for his background in Japanese. Otherwise, he would've been completely lost.
He glanced at the other notebook. On its cover were bold words:
Chakra Extraction Manual
"Japanese… Japan… Special Jonin… ninja… Ninja Academy… chakra…"
Yoru froze.
"…Holy shit. Isn't this Naruto?!"
He was instantly alarmed. This was a world where human lives were cheap—how was an ordinary Earthling supposed to survive here?
Yoru felt like crying.
But thinking about how he had already died in a car accident, he reluctantly accepted it as a second chance at life.
"System! Right—the system!"
As a seasoned otaku, he had read countless fanfictions. Every transmigrator had a system—no matter how useless they were, they could dominate entire worlds with its help.
"System!"
"System, big bro!"
"Open sesame!"
…
He called out countless times in his mind.
No response.
"Don't tell me… I'm one of those legendary no-system geniuses?"
Yoru didn't lose heart.
Among the vast army of transmigrators, aside from those who relied on systems to reach the peak effortlessly, there were also those who seemed to have their potential fully unlocked upon arriving in another world—prodigies who mastered anything they touched and crushed all other geniuses beneath their feet.
Picking up the Chakra Extraction Manual, Yoru quickly began to follow the instructions and cultivate.
One minute…
Ten minutes…
One hour…
He felt absolutely nothing.
"Don't tell me I'm just a cannon-fodder transmigrator?!" Yoru's expression darkened.
In this world, where lives were as worthless as grass and the strong could destroy heaven and earth, ordinary people were nothing more than cannon fodder. One powerful ninjutsu—and dozens would die in an instant.
Sure, the original story was full of ninja funerals. But believing that civilians didn't die in wars would be nothing but naive. In truth, whether on Earth or here, the majority of those who died in war were always ordinary people.
And as a man who had arrived in a familiar anime world—
Who wouldn't dream of sitting upon a throne above the clouds, gazing down upon all living beings, making everyone look up to them in awe?
After failing to find any answers, Yoru decided to deal with the corpse first. If someone discovered it, he, as an outsider, wouldn't be able to explain himself no matter what.
He walked over and instinctively tried to pick up the child's body—
But couldn't lift it.
Only then did Yoru realize something was wrong. As an adult, lifting a child's corpse should have been effortless.
He looked down at himself again.
His hands. His feet.
They were small—like a child's.
"Wait… transmigrating can turn me back into a kid too?"
Instead of panicking, Yoru felt a hint of relief. After all, he looked almost identical to the dead child. If he disposed of the body, no one would likely notice anything wrong for a while.
Switching from lifting to dragging, he decided to hide the corpse in the wardrobe first.
But the moment he pulled the body—
A dazzling red light burst out from behind it.
"This is—!"
Yoru's eyes widened in shock.
"A Devil Fruit?!"